OLD  HOUSES   IN   FARMINGTON 


/ 


AN 

HISTORICAL  ADDRESS 

DELIVERED    AT    THE 

Hnnual  nDeeting 

OF 

The  Village  Library  Company 

OF 

FARMINGTON,  CONN. 

By   JULIUS   GAY 


Hy\KTKORn,    CoNN. 

Press  of  The  Case,  Lfiekwood  &  I'.rainard  Comi)any 
1895 


i 


OLD   HOUSES   IN   FARMINGTON 


AN 


HISTORICAL  ADDRESS 

DELIVERED    AT    THE 

Hnnual  nDcctitiG 

OF 

The  Village  LibraryCompany 

OF 

FARMINGTON,  CONN. 

{May  I,  iSg'y 


By   JULIUS   GAY 

i 


Hakikoki),  Conn. 

Press  of  The  Case,  Lockwood  &  Brainard  Company 

1895 


ADDRESS. 


Ladies  and  Gentlemen   of  the    Village   Library   Company   of 
Farming  ton  : 

I  have  been  requested  to  speak  this  evening  of  the  old 
houses  of  Farmington  and  of  some  of  the  people  who 
lived  in  them.  If  my  paper  be  not  very  profound  with 
great  events  and  much  learning,  it  may  perhaps  none  the 
less,  for  a  passing  hour,  revive  the  fast-fading  picture  of 
our  ancestors,  their  virtues  and  their  foibles. 

In  the  winter  of  1639,  when  the  town  of  Hartford  had 
been  founded  three  and  one-half  years,  and  Windsor  and 
Wethersfield  about  the  same  time,  all  three  towns  began 
to  think  their  broad  acres  too  limited,  and  applied  to  the 
General  Court  "  for  some  enlargement  of  accommodation." 
A  committee  was  appointed  to  view  the  valley  of  the 
Tunxis  and  report  on  the  20th  of  February,  but  Windsor 
was  busy  building  a  bridge  and  a  meeting 'house,  and 
their  neighbors  of  Wethersfield  objected  to  the  wintry 
weather  ;  so  the  Court  added  to  the  committee  Capt.  John 
Mason,  who  had  recently  rid  the  colony  of  600  or  700 
Pequots,  and  who  brought  the  Court  on  the  15th  of  June 
following  to  order  the  Particular  Court  "  to  conclude  the 
conditions  for  the  planting  of  Tunxis." 

Five  years  thereafter,  in  1645,  the  village  of  Tunxis 
vSepus,  literally  the  village  at  the  bend  of  the  little  river, 
became  by  legislative  enactment  the  town  of  Farmington. 

The  settlers  found  the  natural  features  of  the  place 
much  as  we  see  them  to-day.  To  the  east  of  the  main 
street  their  lots  extended  to  the  mountain,  and  on   the 


west  to  the  river,  beyond  which  fertile  meadows  spread 
away  to  the  western  hills,  undisligured  for  more  than  one 
hundred  years  by  divisional  fences,  a  broad  panorama  of 
waving  grain  and  green  corn  fields. 

The  land  was  indeed  owned  in  severalty,  but  annually 
the  proprietors  voted  on  what  day  in  October  they  would 
use  it  for  pasturage,  and  on  what  day  in  April  all  must 
remove  their  flocks  and  herds.  Access  to  this  common 
field  was  through  the  North  Meadow  Gate  just  west  of 
the  Catholic  church,  or  through  the  South  Meadow  Gate 
near  the  Pequabuc  stone  bridge.  Along  the  main  street 
houses  began  to  rise,  log  huts  at  first,  each  provided  by 
law  with  a  ladder  reaching  to  the  ridge  to  be  examined 
every  six  months  by  the  chimney-viewers.  In  171 1  the 
town  granted  fourscore  acres  of  land  to  encourage  the 
erection  of  a  saw-mill,  but  long  before  this  time  frame 
houses  had  been  built,  the  sides  covered  with  short  clap- 
boards split  from  logs.  The  oldest  house  of  which  we 
know  the  date  of  erection  was  built  in  1700  by  John 
Clark  and  stood  until  1880  on  the  east  side  of  High  street, 
a  little  south  of  Mrs.  Barney's.  It  had  a  lean  to  roof,  the 
upper  story  much  projecting,  and  ornamented  with  con- 
spicuous pendants.  Another,  the  last  of  this  style,  but 
with  modern  covering,  still  stands  about  seventy-five  rods 
further  south.  Within,  a  huge  chimney  with  its  enor- 
mous fire-place  and  ovens,  filled  a  large  part  of  the  lower 
story,  barring  all  convenient  access  to  the  interior  of  the 
house  by  the  front  door.  But  this  sacred  portal  was  sel- 
dom used  except  for  weddings,  funerals,  and  days  of 
solemn  thanksgiving.  Later  on  appears  the  gambrel 
roof,  which  was  the  approved  style  until  the  time  of  the 
Revolution,  and  which  is  even  now  being  revived  under 
the  name  of  the  Old  Colonial  style.  The  huge  chimney 
was  at  length  divided  into  two,  and  moved  out  of  the  way 
of  the  front  door,  which  now,  with    its   polished  brass 


5 

knocker,  welcomed  the  approaching-  guest.  An  old  house 
was  seldom  pulled  down,  but,  moved  to  the  rear,  it  made 
a  kitchen  for  the  newer  structure,  so  that  in  time  the 
house  had  as  many  styles  of  architecture  and  dates  of 
erection  as  an  English  cathedral. 

As  we  first  come  in  sight  of  the  village,  looking  down 
upon  it  from  the  Hartford  road,  we  see  on  the  left  one  of 
our  oldest  houses  long  owned  by  Seth  North,  and  built 
by  his  father  Timothy  or  his  grandfather  Thomas.  Mr. 
North  did  not  take  kindly  to  Puritan  ways  and  never 
went  to  church,  and  so  was  universally  known  as  "  Sinner 
North."  By  the  children  he  was  pleased  to  be  addressed 
in  the  most  deferential  manner  as  "  Mr.  Sinner."  A  most 
excellent  authority,  writing  me  about  the  old-time  char- 
acter of  the  village,  mentioned  "its  universally  genteel 
ways,  where  everybody  went  to  church  except  Sinner 
North."  He  w^as  otherwise  so  much  in  accordance  with 
modern  ideas,  that  as  he  drew  near  his  end,  he  ordered 
his  body  to  be  cremated,  the  place  a  lonely  spot  on  the 
mountain  between  two  rocks,  and  his  friend,  Adam  Stew- 
art, chief  cremator,  who  was  to  inherit  the  house  for  his 
kindly  services.  The  civil  authority,  however,  interposed 
and  insisted  on  giving  him  what  they  deemed  a  Christiaji 
burial,  but  Adam  vStewart  got  the  house  and  it  remained 
in  the  family  many  years.  Nearly  opposite  stood  in  Rev- 
olutionary days  the  tavern  of  Samuel  North,  Jr.  He,  too, 
found  his  ways  at  variance  with  public  opinion,  bought, 
as  he  states  it,  his  rum,  sugar,  tea,  etc.,  in  violation  of  the 
excise  laws,  in  foreign  parts,  sold  them  for  Continental 
money  which  proved  worthless,  and  then  was  arrested  on 
complaint  of  Thomas  Lewis  and  Deacon  Bull  and  fined 
;^ioo,  the  General  Court  declining  to  interfere.  A  little 
east  of  Mr.  North's  tavern  stood  the  home  of  the  Bird 
family  from  whom  the  hill  derived  its  name.  They  have 
all  long  ago  taken  their  flight  to  other  towns,  but  our  old- 


est  men  can  easily  remember  the  old  house  and  the  tragic 
end  of  Noadiah  Bird,  one  of  the  last  of  the  family  who 
dwelt  there.  He  was  killed  by  an  escaped  lunatic  on  the 
night  of  Sunday,  May  15,  1825,  and  the  attempt  to  capture 
the  lunatic  resulted  in  the  death  of  still  another  citizen. 
Descending  the  hill  toward  the  west,  we  find  on  the  cor- 
ner where  the  road,  formerly  called  the  road  to  Simsbury, 
runs  northward,  an  old  house  once  the  home  of  Josiah 
North,  and  soon  after  his  death  in  1784,  passing  into  the 
hands  of  Capt.  Isaac  Buck,  who  there  lived  and  died  at  an 
advanced  age.  But  we  must  not  linger  on  the  site  of  the 
numerous  houses  that  once  looked  over  the  valley  from 
this  hill,  only  at  the  foot  we  must  stay  a  moment,  though 
the  little  red  house  of  Gov.  Treadwell,  just  north  of  Poke 
brook  and  west  of  the  big  rock  can  only  be  remembered 
by  the  oldest  of  our  people.  Dr.  Porter  and  Professor 
Denison  Olmsted  have  both  written  worthy  memorials 
of  this  eminent  patriot,  scholar,  and  Christian,  but  any 
exhaustive  account  of  his  public  services  must  be  a  his- 
tory of  the  common  school  system  of  Connecticut,  of  the 
rise  of  foreign  missions,  and  of  much  of  the  political  his- 
tory of  the  State  in  the  days  of  the  Revolution. 

Crossing  the  brook  and  walking  on  the  line  of  the  old 
road  which  once  ran  where  the  south  gate  of  the  prem- 
ises of  Mr.  Barney  stands,  we  come  upon  the  house  of 
Mr.  P^liiah  L.  Lewis,  built  for  his  grandfather  Elijah  in 
1790,  the  family  living  while  it  was  building  in  an  old 
house  just  west.  Going  southerly  about  thirty  rods,  we 
find  on  the  corner  next  south  of  the  North  schoolhouse 
an  old  gambrel-roofed  building  with  the  end  towards  the 
street,  and,  in  some  far-off  time,  painted  red.  In  1752 
it  was  the  property  of  Daniel  Curtis,  who,  twenty  years 
thereafter,  sold  it  to  his  son  Gabriel,  who,  after  another 
twenty  years,  found  it  necessary  to  pay  Capt.  Judah 
Woodruff"  for  new  windows  and  for  twenty  days'  labor  in 


making  the  old  structure  habitable.  •  Gabriel  was  a  tanner 
and  shoemaker,  and  in  1812  sold  out  to  Frederick  Andrus 
of  the  same  trade,  removing  to  Burlington,  Vermont. 
The  old  house  now  became  the  noisy  abode  of  journey- 
men shoemakers  pounding  leather  under  the  direction  of 
Mr.  Andrus,  thereafter  known  as  Boss  Andrus.  He  died 
in  1845,  and  the  old  house  followed  the  usual  dreary 
fortunes  of  a  tenement  house  until,  in  1882,  we  find  it 
transformed  by  the  subtle  magic  of  a  genial  philanthropy, 
into  the  home  of  the  Tunxis  Library.  Entertaining 
books  fill  every  nook  and  corner,  and  antique  furniture 
ranged  around  the  vast  old-time  fireplace  welcome  readers 
young  and  old  to  a  free  and   healthful   entertainment. 

The  old  house  next  west,  in  1752  the  residence  of 
Daniel  Curtis,  became  thereafter  the  home  of  his  son 
Solomon  until  he  died  in  the  army  in  1776.  In  1822,  his 
heirs  sold  it  to  Frederick  Andrus.  The  brick  blacksmith 
shop  and  the  white  house  adjoining  were  built  soon  after 
1823  by  Charles  Frost.  The  land  on  which  the  house 
next  west  stands  was  successively  owned  by  the  families 
of  Norton,  Rew,  Judd,  North,  Smith,  Whitmore,  and 
DeWolf.  I  do  not  know  who  built  the  house.  The  Elm 
Tree  Inn,  where  Phinehas  Lewis  once  kept  a.  famous  tav- 
ern in  revolutionary  days,  was   built   at   various   times. 

Just  across  the  line  on  what  was  once  the  garden  of 
Col.  Gay  and  of  three  generations  of  his  descendants, 
stood  the  little  red  shop  now  removed  to  the  east  side  of 
the  Waterville  road  just  north  of  Poke  brook.  In  1795, 
Gabriel  Curtis  pays  Capt.  Judah  Woodruff  thirteen  shil- 
lings for  making  for  it  a  show  window  of  thirty-two 
sashes  (you  can  count  them  to-day  if  you  like)  for  his  son 
Lewis  Curtis.  Lewis  advertises  in  the  Connecticut  Courant 
under  date  of  1799,  "that  he  still  continues  to  carry  on 
the  clock-making  business,  such  as  chime  clocks  that  play 
a  number  of  different  tunes  and  clocks  that   exhibit  the 


8 

moon's  age,"  etc.,  etc.  A  few  steps  down  the  hill  west- 
ward bring  us  to  the  house  built  by  Col.  Fisher  Gay  in 
1766  and  1767,  as  appears  by  his  ledger  account  with 
Capt.  Woodruff.  Col.  Gay  died  early  in  the  war,  and 
some  account  of  his  public  services  can  be  found  in  H.  P. 
Johnston's  "  Yale  in  the  Revolution." 

Crossing  the  Waterville  road,  we  come  to  the  house 
opposite  the  Catholic  Church,  some  parts  of  which  are 
very  old,  the  upper  story  of  the  front,  however,  having 
been  built  by  the  late  Capt.  Pomeroy  Strong,  soon  after 
he  bought  the  place  in  1802.  There  was,  as  early  as 
1645,  one  more  house  to  the  west,  and  then  came  the 
North  Meadow  gate. 

Returning  now  to  the  main  street,  the  highway  com- 
mittee in  1785  sold  to  Deacon  Samuel  Richards  a  strip 
out  of  the  center  of  the  highway,  26  feet  wide,  where,  in 
the  year  following,  he  built  the  little  shop  in  which  traffic 
has  been  carried  on  successively  by  himself,  Horace  and 
Timothy  Cowles,  James  K  Camp,  William  Gay,  and  by 
his  son,  the  present  owner.  Crossing  the  trolley  track, 
we  come  upon  the  lot  on  which  Daniel  Curtis  and  his 
youngest  son,  Eleazer,  had  in  1783,  as  the  deed  reads, 
"  mutually  agreed  to  build  a  new  house,  ....  and 
have  large  provision  for  the  same."  As  they  held  it 
until  1794,  it  is  probable  that  the  present  edifice  was  built 
by  them.  The  next  house  south,  where  j\Ir.  Abner  Bid- 
well  lived  many  years,  was  built  by  Deacon  Samuel 
Richards  in  1 792  as  he  records  in  his  diary. 

I  have  spoken  at  some  length  in  my  last  paper  of  this 
very  worthy  man  and  of  his  honorable  service  all  through 
the  revolutionary  war.  He  was  a  Puritan  of  the  Puritans, 
of  the  strictest  integrit)^  kindly  of  heart,  precise  in  man- 
ner, and  with  a  countenance  grave,  not  to  say  solemn,  as 
became  a  deacon  of  the  olden  time.  It  is  related  that  a 
small  boy  once  sent  to  his  store,  was  so  overpowered  by 


the  gravity  of  his  demeanor,  that  instead  of  asking  for  a 
pair  of  H  and  L  hinges,  he  demanded  of  the  horrified 
deacon  a  pair  of  archangels.  He  was  the  first  postmaster 
of  Farmington.  On  the  226.  of  July,  1799,  he  advertises  in 
the  Conncxticut  Courant  : 

"Information.  A  post-office  is  established  at  Farmington  for 
public  accommodation.     Samuel  Richards,  D.  P.  Master." 

The  post-ofhce  was  in  the  front  hall  of  his  house,  and  the 
half  dozen  letters  that  sometimes  accumulated  were 
fastened  again.st  the  wall  by  tapes  crossing  each  other  in 
a  diamond  pattern.  Five  years  later  he  records  in  his 
diary,  "  Kept  the  post-office,  the  proceeds  of  which  were 
forty  dollars,  the  one-half  of  which  I  gave  to  Horace 
Cowles  for  assisting  me."  The  year  after  he  obtained 
this  lucrative  office,  instead  of  recording  as  heretofore  the 
"  continuation  of  distress  in  my  temporal  concerns,"  he 
deplores  "  my  unthankfulness  to  God  for  his  great  good- 
ness to  me.     He  is  now  trying  me  by  prosperity." 

Immediately  to  the  south  stands  a  house  which,  before 
it  was  modernized  by  the  late  Mr.  Leonard  Winship,  I 
remember  as  an  old  red,  dilapidated  structure,  built  by  I 
know  not  whom.  During  the  Revolution  it  was  owned 
by  Nehemiah  Street,  who,  as  I  told  you  at  the  opening  of 
this  library,  was  fined  along  with  many  of  the  young- 
people  of  the  village,  becau.se,  being  assembled  at  his 
house,  they  refused  to  disperse  until  after  nine  o'clock  at 
night.  Mr.  vStreet  was  frequently  in  similar  trouble  until 
disgusted  with  Puritan  ways,  he  converted  his  goods 
into  money  and  sought  the  freedom  of  the  far  West. 
Poor  Nehemiah  !  He  soon  found  something  worse  than 
New  England  justice.  Having  invested  his  money  in  a 
drove  of  cattle,  he  sold  them  at  Niagara  Falls  for  six  hun- 
dred pounds  and  fell  in  with  a  certain  James  Gale  of 
Goshen,  N.  Y.,  who  during  the  war  comnianded  a  plunder- 


lO 

ing  party  on  Long  Island.  This  treacherous  companion 
followed  him  from  Niagara,  and  watching  his  opportunity 
while  Mr.  Street  was  bending  over  a  spring  of  water  by 
the  roadside,  struck  him  from  behind  with  a  tomahawk, 
and  all  the  troubles  of  Nehemiah  were  ended. 

The  land  to  the  south  once  belonged  to  Rev.  Samuel 
Hooker  and  remained  in  the  family  for  four  generations. 
Here  stands  the  house  where  Major  Hooker  lived  and 
died,  and  where,  under  a  great  elm  tree  in  front,  most 
genial  of  story-tellers,  he  was  wont  to  sit  of  a  summer 
evening  and  entertain  his  youthful  friends.  On  this 
locality  lived  his  father,  Roger,  and  his  grandfather,  John. 
The  latter  was  an  assistant,  a  judge  of  the  Superior  Court 
and  a  man  of  note  in  the  colony.  Deacon  Edward  Hooker 
states  that  John  Hooker  and  the  Rev.  Samuel  Whitman 
were  the  only  men  in  town  that  were  saluted  with  the 
title  of  Mr.  Others  were  known  as  Goodman  or  Gaffer. 
Mr.  Whitman,  the  minister,  he  says,  would  always  wait 
on  the  meeting-house  steps  for  Mr.  Hooker  to  come  up 
and  enter  the  house  with  him  on  Sabbath  morning  and 
share  with  him  the  respectful  salutation  of  the  people. 

Passing  over  the  site  where  once  stood  the  store  of 
Samuel  Smith,  we  come  to  the  brick  building  erected  in 
1 79 1  by  Reuben  S.  Norton  for  a  store,  and  which  has 
since  been  used  for  divers  purposes  —  store,  tailor's  shop, 
tenement  house,  post-office,  church,  groggery,  and  now, 
much  enlarged,  for  a  savings  bank.  Where  my  house 
stands,  there  stood,  until  I  removed  it  in  1872,  the  very 
old  house  of  Solomon  Whitman.  At  the  northeast  corner 
was  a  square  addition  in  which  Miss  Nancy  Whitman 
presided  over  the  post-office.  I  remember  calling  on  the 
way  from  school  and  seeing  through  the  small  delivery 
window  a  huge  dining-table  covered  with  methodically- 
arranged  letters  and  papers,  and  Miss  Nancy,  with  gold- 
rimmed  spectacles,   bending  over   them.     By  this   little 


II 

window,  on  a  high  shelf,  to  be  out  of  reach  of  mischievous 
boys,  stood  a  big  dinner  bell  to  call  the  postmistress,  when 
necessary,  from  regions  remote.  Sometimes  an  advent- 
urous youth,  by  climbing  on  the  back  of  a  comrade,  suc- 
ceeded in  getting  hold  of  the  bell,  but  I  never  knew  the 
same  boy  to  repeat  the  offense.  The  next  buildings  are 
modern,  so  let  us  hurry  on  past  the  drug  store  built  some- 
where between  1813  and  1818  by  Elijah  and  Gad  Cowles, 
and  past  the  brick  schoolhouse  of  Miss  Porter,  built  by 
Major  Cowles  as  a  hotel  to  accommodate  the  vast  con- 
course of  travelers  about  to  come  to  the  village  by  the 
Farmington  canal.  Next  comes  a  house  built  by  Capt. 
Judah  WoodruiT  for  Thomas  Hart  Hooker  in  1768,  and 
very  soon  passing  with  the  mill  property  into  the  posses- 
sion of  the  Demings.  It  was  said  during  the  days  of 
fugitive  slave  laws  to  have  been  an  important  station  on 
the  underground  railroad.  It  is  best  known  to  most  of  us 
as  the  residence  of  the  late  Samuel  Deming,  Esq.,  for 
many  years  a  trial  ju.stice  of  the  town,  who  fearlessly 
executed  the  law,  whether  his  barns  were  burned,  or 
whatever  happened.  We  did  not  suffer  from  that  curse 
of  society,  a  lax  administration  of  justice.  The  house 
next  north  of  the  post-oftice,  now  owned  by  Mr.  Chauncey 
Deming,  is  said  by  the  historian  of  the  "  Hart  Family"  to 
have  belonged  to  Deacon  John  Hart,  son  of  Capt.  John, 
and  if  so,  must  be  about  150  years  old.  The  land  was 
in  the  Hart  family  for  five  generations.  Near  the  site 
of  the  post-office  stood  the  house  of  Sergeant  John  Hart, 
son  of  Deacon  Stephen,  the  immigrant,  in  which  he 
with  his  family  were  burned  on  the  night  of  Saturday, 
December  15,  1666,  eight  persons  in  all,  only  one  son, 
afterward  known  as  Capt.  John,  escaped,  he  being  ab- 
sent at  their  farm  in  Nod,  now  Avon.  From  this  point 
southward  to  the  road  down  to  the  new  cemetery,  all 
the  houses  were  destroyed  by  the  great  fire  of  July  21, 


12 

1864,  including  the  long  yellow  house,  just  north  of  the 
present  parsonage,  which  was  the  home  of  Rev.  Timothy 
Pitkin  during  his  sixty  years'  residence  in  our  village. 
In  my  last  paper  I  spoke  of  him  as  a  patriot  in  the  War  of 
Independence.  Of  his  high  character  and  fervid  elo- 
■  quence  as  pastor  and  preacher,  we  have  the  testimony  of 
Dr.  Porter  in  his  "  Half-Century  Discourse."  Professor 
Olmsted  says  of  him  :  "  Do  you  not  see  him  coming  in  at 
yonder  door,  habited  in  his  flowing  blue  cloak,  with  his 
snow-white  wig  and  tri-cornered  hat  of  the  olden  time  ? 
Do  you  not  see  him  wending  his  way  through  the  aisle  to 
the  pulpit,  bowing  on  either  side  with  the  dignity  and 
grace  of  the  old  nobility  of  Connecticut?"  Immediately 
south  of  the  road  to  the  new  cemetery  stands  the  brick 
house  built  by  Dr.  Porter  in  1808,  the  year  of  his  mar- 
riage. We  need  not  linger  in  our  hasty  progress  to  speak 
of  the  manifold  virtues  of  one  too  well  known  to  us  all, 
and  personally  to  many  of  us  to  need  any  eulogies  here. 
The  next  house,  now  the  residence  of  Mr.  Rowe,  was 
built  by  the  Rev.  Joseph  Washburn  on  a  lot  purchased 
by  him  for  that  purpose  in  1796.  This  healer  of  dissen- 
sions and  much-loved  pastor,  after  a  settlement  of  eleven 
years,  while  seeking  a  mild  southern  climate  in  his  failing 
health,  died  on  the  voyage  on  Christmas  day,  1805,  and 
was  buried  at  sea.  A  few  years  later  his  house  became 
the  home  of  this  library  under  the  care  of  Deacon  Elijah 
Porter.  The  large  brick  house  on  the  top  of  the  hill, 
with  its  imposing  Roman  fagade  looking  southward,  was 
built  by  Gen.  George  Cowles.  The  house  on  the  corner, 
long  the  residence  of  Zenas  Cowles,  and  now  owned  by 
Lieut.-Commander  Cowles  of  the  U.  S.  Navy,  of  a  style 
of  architecture  much  superior  to  all  houses  of  the  vil- 
lage of  that  time  and  perhaps  of  any  time,  is  said  to 
have  been  designed  by  an  officer  of  Burgoyne's  army  sent 
here  as  a  prisoner  of  war.     The  house  next  north  of  it 


13 

was  bought  by  the  late  Richard  Cowles  in  1810,  and  must 
have  been  built  by  its  former  owner  and  occupant,  Coral 
Case,  or  by  his  father,  John  Case. 

But  it  is  high  time  that  we  crossed  the  street  and  com- 
menced our  return.  Nearly  opposite  the  last-mentioned 
house  stood  the  dwelling  of  the  Rev.  Samuel  Hooker, 
second  minister  of  Farmington,  of  whom  I  have  formerly 
spoken.  On  this  site,  and  probably  in  the  same  house, 
lived  Roger  Newton,  his  brother-in-law  and  the  first 
pastor  of  this  church.  On  the  13th  of  October,  1652,  he 
stood  up  with  six  other  Christian  men,  and  they  known 
in  New  England  phraseology  as  the  '*  Seven  Pillars  of 
the  Church,"  seeking  no  authority  from  any  intermediary 
church,  consociation,  bishop,  priest,  or  earthly  hierarch, 
but  deriving  their  powers  from  the  Word  of  God  alone, 
as  they  understood  it,  declared  themselves  to  be  the  First 
Church  of  Christ  in  Farmington.  Probably  during  the 
pastorate  of  Mr.  Newton  there  was  no  meeting-house. 
The  Fast  Day  service  of  December,  1666,  we  know  was 
held  at  the  house  of  Sergeant  John  Hart,  two  days  before 
the  fire,  and  there  is  a  carefully  transmitted  tradition, 
that  the  services  of  the  vSabbath  were  held  on  the  west 
side  of  the  main  street  a  little  south  of  the  Meadow  Lane, 
and,  therefore,  probably  at  the  house  owned  by  Mrs. 
Sarah  Wilson,  sister  of  Rev.  Samuel  Hooker,  where  now 
stands  the  house  of  T.  H.  and  L.  C.  Root.  We  hear  of 
no  meeting-house  until  1672,  when  the  record  called  the 
New  Book  begins,  the  "  ould  book  "  having  been  worn 
out  and  lost,  and  with  it  all  account  of  the  erection  of  the 
first  house.  In  September,  1657,  Mr.  Newton  was  dis- 
missed from  this  church  and  went  to  Boston  to  take  ship 
for  England.  What  befel  him  by  the  way  is  narrated  by 
John  Hull,  mint-master  of  Boston,  he  who  coined  the 
famous  pine-tree  shillings.  After  waiting  on  shipboard 
at   Nantasket    Roads  six  or  eight  days  for  a  favorable 


14 

wind,  the  commissioners  of  the  colonies  and  the  Rev. 
John  Norton  sent  for  him,  desiring  a  conference  before 
his  departure.  The  captain  of  the  vessel  and  his  associ- 
ates, of  a  race  always  superstitious,  thinking  this  divine 
another  Jonah  and  the  cause  of  their  detention,  hurried 
him  on  shore,  and,  the  wind  immediately  turning  fair, 
sailed  on  their  way  without  him.  He  remained  in  Boston 
several  weeks,  preaching  for  Rev.  John  Norton  on  the 
17th  of  October.  After  this  date,  we  lose  sight  of  him 
until  his  settlement  in  ]Milford  on  the  226.  of  August,  1660. 
Crossing  the  road  formerly  known  as  "  the  highway 
leading  to  the  old  mill  place,"  and  a  century  later  as 
"  Hatter's  Lane,"  we  come  to  the  house  next  south  of  the 
old  cemetery,  owned  and  probably  built  by  John  Mix. 
He  was  commonly  known  as  Squire  Mix,  a  graduate  of 
Yale,  an  officer  of  the  Revolution,  ten  years  Judge  of 
Probate,  thirty-two  years  town  clerk,  and  twenty-six  years 
a  representative  to  the  General  Assembly.  He  was,  as  I 
am  told  by  those  who  knew  him  well,  tall  in  stature, 
dressed  as  a  gentleman  of  the  time,  with  silver  knee- 
buckles,  formal  in  manner,  of  quick  temper,  punctilious, 
very  hospitable,  a  good  neighbor,  a  member  of  no  church, 
and  bound  by  no  creed,  and  in  politics  a  federalist.  In 
his  latter  days,  when  old  age  and  total  blindness  shut  him 
out  from  the  busy  world,  when  the  political  party  of  his 
active  days  had  passed  away,  and  new  men  who  hated  the 
names  of  Washington  and  Hamilton  filled  all  the  old 
familiar  places  in  the  town,  the  State,  and  the  nation,  he 
is  said  to  have  sometimes  longed  for  a  judicious  use  of 
the  thunderbolts  of  the  Almighty.  Here,  too,  for  much 
of  his  life  lived  his  son  Ebenezer  iSIix,  universally  known 
as  Captain  Eb.,  who  made  voyages  to  China  and  brought 
back  to  the  merchant  princes  of  the  town,  tea,  spices, 
silks,  china  tea-sets,  marked  with  the  names  of  wealthy 
purchasers,  and  all  the  luxuries  of  the  Orient. 


15 

Passing  the  house  adjoining  the  burying-ground  on 
the  north,  the  home  of  this  library  and  of  Deacon  Elijah 
Porter  until  his  marriage  in  1812,  we  come  to  the  house 
built  by  Mr.  Asahel  Wadsworth,  and  which  was  reported 
unfinished  in  1781  when  the  General  Assembly,  dissatis- 
fied with  its  treatment  by  the  inn-keepers  of  Hartford, 
proposed  to  finish  their  winter  session  elsewhere,  and  re- 
quested the  selectmen  of  Farmington  to  report  what 
accommodation  could  be  obtained  here.  The  next  house, 
from  which  the  stage  coach  goes  its  daily  rounds,  was 
once  the  residence  of  Mr.  Asa  Andrews,  and  after  1826,  of 
his  son-in-law,  the  late  Deacon  Simeon  Hart.  In  the 
brick  shop  next  north,  Mr.  Andrews  made  japanned  tin 
ware.  He  was  the  maker  of  those  chandeliers,  com- 
pounds of  wood  and  tin,  that  long  hung  from  the  meeting- 
house ceiling.  Crossing  the  street  formerly  known  as  the 
Little  Back  Lane,  we  come  to  the  house  built  by  Asa 
Andrews  on  land  bought  in  1804,  and  where  Deacon  vSim- 
eon  Hart  for  many  years  kept  his  well-known  school. 
About  twenty  rods  south,  on  the  east  side  of  that  street, 
we  come  to  the  gambrel-roofed  house  built  by  Hon. 
Timothy  Pitkin,  LL.D.,  on  a  lot  bought  by  him  in  1788. 
He  was  a  son  of  the  Rev.  Timothy  Pitkin,  a  graduate  of 
Yale,  a  lawyer  by  profession,  five  times  speaker  of  the 
Legislature,  a  member  of  Congress  from  1806  to  1820, 
and  the  author  of  a  "  Political  and  Civil  History  of  the 
United  States,"  of  great  value  as  a  book  of  reference. 
Next  south  is  the  gambrel-roofed  house  formerly  the 
home  of  Capt.  Selah  Porter,  and  immediately  beyond  this 
once  stood  the  house  of  Deacon  Martin  Bull  and  of  his 
father  before  him. 

Returning  to  the  late  residence  of  Deacon  Simeon 
Hart,  and  crossing  the  now  vacant  lot  where  once  flour- 
ished the  famous  inn  of  Amos  Cowles,  we  reach  the  house 
with    Ionic   columns  built  by   the  late    Major   Timothy 


l6 

Cowles.  Cliatincey  Jerome,  in  his  "  History  of  the  Amer- 
ican Clock  Business,"  says,  under  date  of  1815  : 

"I moved  to  the  town  of  Farmington and  went 

to  work  for  Capt.  Selah  Porter  for  twenty  dollars  per  month.  We 
built  a  house  for  Major  Timothy  Cowles,  which  was  then  the  best 
one  in  Farmington." 

The  meeting-house  next  on  our  way  need  not  detain  us. 
He  who  would  attempt  to  add  to  the  graphic  and  exhaust- 
ive history  by  President  Porter  would  be  presumptuous 
indeed.  The  next  house  of  brick  was  built  by  Gad 
Cowles  within  the  century,  and  the  three-story  house  of 
Dr.  Wheeler  on  the  corner,  by  Jonathan  Cowles  in  1 799. 

Crossing  the  road  up  the  mountain,  we  find  on  the 
corner  the  square  house  with  the  pyramidal  roof  and  the 
chimney  in  the  center  owned  and  occupied  b)^  the  Rev. 
Samuel  Whitman  during  his  ministry.  Parts,  if  not  the 
whole,  of  the  building  are  much  older  than  its  well-pre- 
served walls  would  indicate.  Tradition  says  the  kitchen 
was  built  out  of  the  remains  of  the  old  meeting-house, 
and  the  Rev.  William  S.  Porter,  who  knew  more  about 
the  history  of  the  town  than  any  man  who  has  ever  lived 
or  is  likely  to  live,  says  that  the  house,  probably  the  front, 
was  built  by  Cuff  Freeman,  a  colored  man  of  considerable 
wealth,  of  course  after  the  death  of  Mr.  Whitman. 

Leaving  the  main  street  and  ascending  the  hill  to  the 
east,  we  come  at  the  dividing  line  between  the  grounds 
about  Miss  Porter's  schoolhouse  and  the  late  residence  of 
Rev.  T.  K.  Fessenden  to  the  site  of  the  house  of  Col. 
Noadiah  Hooker,  known  as  the  "  Old  Red  College  "  dur- 
ing the  days  when  his  son,  Deacon  Edward,  there  fitted 
Southern  young  men  for  college.  Commander  Edward 
Hooker  of  the  United  States  Navy  sends  me  a  plan  of  the 
old  house,  which  he  of  course  well  remembers.  He  says, 
"  the  part  marked  kitchen  was  floored  with  smooth,  flat 
mountain  stones,  and  had  a  big  door  at  the  eastern  end, 


17 

and  originally  at  each  end,  and  my  father  used  to  say  that 
when  his  father  was  a  boy,  they  used  to  drive  a  yoke  of 
oxen  with  a  sled  load  of  wood  into  one  door  and  up  to  the 
big  fireplace,  then  unload  the  wood  upon  the  fire  and 
drive  the  team  out  of  the  other  door."  Of  the  building 
of  the  house  on  the  corner  eastward,  we  have  the  most 
minute  account  from  the  time  when  in  January,  1811, 
Capt.  Luther  Seymour  drew  the  plan  to  the  25  th  of  May, 
18 12,  when  Deacon  Hooker  took  possession  with  his 
youthful  bride.  We  even  know  the  long  list  of  those 
who  helped  raise  the  frame  and  of  those  who  came  too 
late  for  the  raising  but  in  time  for  the  refreshments. 

But  we  must  hurry  back  to  the  main  street,  lest  with 
the  rich  materials  at  hand  for  an  account  of  this  most 
interesting  man,  we  detain  you  beyond  all  proper  bounds. 
The  next  old  house  to  the  north,  the  home  of  Col.  Martin 
Cowles,  was  built  and  occupied  by  John  Porter  in  1784. 
Opposite  the  Savings  Bank,  the  south  part  of  the  long 
house  once  the  residence  of  Reuben  S.  Norton,  merchant, 
was  built  by  his  grandfather,  Thomas  Smith,  Sen.,  and 
the  north  third,  by  Deacon  Thomas  Smith,  son  of  the 
latter.  The  next  house,  long  the  residence  of  Horace 
Cowles,  Esq.,  was  built  by  Samuel  Smith,  brother  of  the 
Deacon,  in  1769,  and  is  a  good  specimen  of  the  style  of 
houses  erected  by  Capt.  Judah  Woodruff.  The  next  old 
house,  with  the  high  brick  basement,  was  built  about 
1 797  by  Capt.  Luther  Seymour,  cabinet-maker  and  house- 
builder.  Many  choice  pieces  of  old  furniture  in  town, 
much  prized  by  relic-hunters,  were  the  work  of  his  hand, 
but  a  large  part  of  his  work,  thickly  studded  with  brass 
nail  heads,  as  was  the  fashion  of  the  time,  has  been  for- 
ever hidden  from  sight  under  the  sods  of  the  old  burying- 
ground.  Capt.  Seymour  was  also  librarian  of  one  of  the 
.several  libraries  which  divided  the  literary  patronage  of 
the  village.  The  next  house  on  a  slight  elevation  stands 
3 


on  a  lot  bought  in  1769  by  John  Thomson,  third  in  descent 
of  that  name,  conspicuous  about  town  with  his  leathern 
jacket  and  his  pronounced  opinions  on  Continental  paper 
money.  Here  lived  three  generations  of  his  descendants. 
Passing  the  house  owned  by  Dr.  Thomson,  and  before 
him  by  Mr.  James  K.  Camp,  and  two  other  buildings,  we 
come  to  a  house  built  or  largely  renewed  in  1808  b}- 
Nathaniel  Olmsted,  goldsmith  and  clockmaker.  Here 
for  twenty  years  were  made  the  tall  clocks  bearing  his 
name,  which  still  correctly  measure  time  with  their  sol- 
emn beat.  He  removed  to  New  Haven  to  be  near  his 
brother.  Professor  Denison  Olmsted,  and  there  died  in 
.  1 860,  most  genial  and  loveable  of  men.  His  funeral  dis- 
course was  from  the  words,  "  Behold  an  Israelite  indeed  in 
.whom  is  no  guile."  We  will  halt  under  the  big  elm  tree, 
which  overhangs  the  little  house  where  Manin  Curtis 
spent  his  life,  long  enough  to  say  that  his  father,  Sylvanus 
Curtis,  in  company  with  Phinehas  Lewis  in  1762,  the  year 
when  Sylvanus  was  married,  brought  home  from  a  swamp 
three  elm  trees.  One  was  planted  back  of  the  Elm  Tree 
Inn,  one  in  front  of  the  house  of  Mr.  Curtis,  and  the  third 
failed  to  live.  The  big  elm  tree  is,  therefore,  133  years 
old.  (On  the  corner  eastward  stands  the  house,  much 
improved  of  late,  built  in  1786  and  1787  by  Capt.  Judah 
Woodruff  for  Major  Peter  Curtiss,  an  officer  in  the  Rev- 
olutionary War,  who  removed  to  Granby  in  1790,  and 
was  the  first  keeper  of  the  reconstructed  Newgate  prison, 
.leaving  it  in  1796  in  declining  health,  and  dying  in  1797. 
Omitting  the  other  houses  on  the  west  side  of  High  street, 
for  want  of  time  and  information,  we  come  to  the  house 
lately  owned  by  Selah  Westcott,  built  by  Major  Samuel 
Dickinson  on  a  lot  bought  by  him  in  1813.  Major  Dick- 
inson was  a  house-builder,  and  when  the  Farmington 
canal  was  opened,  he  commanded  the  first  packet  boat 
which  sailed  southward  from  our  wharves  on  the  loth  of 


19 

November,  1828,  on  which  a  six-year-old  boy,  afterward  a 
gallant  U.  S.  naval  officer  in  the  late  war,  made  his  first 
voyage,  sailing  as  far  south  as  the  old  South  Basin.  He 
writes  me :  "  Long  live  the  memory  of  the  old '  James  Hill- 
house  ,'  and  her  jolly  Captain  Dickinson,  who  was  not  only 
a  royal  canal  boat  captain,  but  a  famous  builder,  whose 
work  still  stands  before  you  in  the  '  Old  Red  Bridge,'  one 
of  the  best  and  most  substantially  built  bridges  of  Con- 
necticut." On  the  northeast  corner  of  the  intersection  of 
High  street  with  the  road  to  New  Britain,  long  stood  the 
house  of  Capt.  Joseph  Porter,  one  of  the  three  houses  on 
the  east  side  of  High  street,  with  much  projecting  upper 
stories  and  conspicuous  pendants,  built  about  1700.  This 
was  moved  some  rods  up  the  hill  when  Mr.  Franklin 
Woodford  built  his  new  house,  and  was  burned  on  the 
evening  of' January  15,  1886.  So  there  remains  but  oneof 
the  three  houses,  the  one  bought  by  Rev.  Samuel  Whit- 
man for  his  son,  Elnathan,  in  1735,  and  is  the  same  house 
sold  by  John  Stanley,  Sen.,  to  Capt.  Ebenezer  Steel  in 
1 720.  j  Descending  to  the  low  ground  on  the  north  and 
rising  again,  we  come  to  the  gambrel-roofed  house  where 
lived  Dr.  Eli  Todd  from  1 798  tmtil  his  removal  to  Hart- 
ford in  1 819.  Of  this  eminent  man  you  will  find  appreci- 
ative notices  in  the  two  addresses  of  President  Porter  and 
in  the  article  on  the  Connecticut  Retreat  for  the  Insane 
by  Dr.  vStearns  in  the  Memorial  History  of  Hartford 
County.  He  will  probably  be  longest  remembered  as  the 
first  superintendent  of  the  Connecticut  Retreat  for  the 
Insane  in  Hartford,  where  his  system  of  minimum  re- 
straint and  kind  treatment  opened  a  new  era  for  suffering 
humanity.  At  the  northern  end  of  Pligh  street,  facing 
the  road  to  the  river,  we  make  our  last  stop  at  the  house 
of  Mrs.  Barney,  built  by  Capt.  Judah  Woodruff  about 
1805  for  Phinehas  Lewis.  Between  this  house  and  the 
place  from  which  we  set  out,  there  stands  no  house,  old  or 


20 

new,  to  detain  us  longer.  Thanking  you  for  the  patience 
with  which  you  have  endured  our  long  walk  through  the 
village  streets,  I  am  reminded  that  it  is  time  we  parted 
company  with  the  old  worthies  whom  we  have  called  up 
before  us  for  the  entertainment  of  an  idle  hour,  remem- 
bering that  in  times  gone  by  they  were  wont  to  hale 
before  his  Excellency  the  Governor  such  as,  having  assem- 
bled themselves  together,  refused  to  disperse  until  after 
nine  of  the  clock. 


THE  LIBRARY 
UNIVERSITY  OF  CALIFORNIA 

Santa  Barbara 


THIS  BOOK  IS  DUE  ON  THE  LAST  DATE 
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Series  9482 


